Photo Credit: Casey Ulrich
Today is the last of my wonderful guest posts (sniff, sniff) and we have a fabulous send off for you. Allow me to introduce you to Casey from Beautiful Disasters, another delightful blogger that you will definitely fall in love with. She has made many treats for her family’s birthday celebrations and I would love to have any one of them for mine!!
Casey is a lovely young woman who is having fun creating all kinds of delectable meals. Today she is sharing one heck of a cake with three components that will have everyone begging for seconds. Thank goodness she followed in her Papa’s footsteps – he always has something sweet after eating both lunch and dinner – her true passion is baking and desserts! For those with a major sweet tooth, you definitely want to head to her recipe pages and check out the dessert recipes … you will thank me! And don’t miss her savory recipes too, I want one of everything!
And now, Heeeere’s Casey!!
Photo Credit: Casey Ulrich
Hey all Heritage Cook readers!! I’m Casey from Beautiful Disasters visiting for the day here at Jane’s blog. This is my very first time guest-posting and I just couldnotbe any more excited! Jane and I met each other through the Secret Recipe Club (joining that club is one of the best blogging decisions I have EVER made, by the way), and I am so thankful I got to [virtually] meet her. I can’t believe how professional her blog is, I hope to someday be on as professional a level as her!
Anyway, for Chocolate Monday I decided I would share with you guys a few birthday celebration ideas and recipes. My sister’s birthday is in just two days and even though she is thousands and thousands of miles away in Spain, she asked our family to still celebrate with a slice of cake.
Over the years I have made a few different desserts for birthdays in my family. I made one monster of an ice cream cake for my brother’s birthday. And a smaller, layered ice cream cake for my own birthday.
Photo Credit: Casey Ulrich
A double layered ice cream pie for a second celebration of my birthday … you can never party enough!
And then, a Mounds-Almond Joy candy bar-inspired ice cream pie for my Dad’s birthday!
Photo Credit: Casey Ulrich
But back to today’s recipe – Since my sister is practically the definition of a chocaholic, I decided to go with a Triple Chocolate Cake to honor her birthday. This cake has two layers of my dark chocolate cake recipe (that I’ve posted on my blog before-but I’ll put it on here for you guys!) and then a layer of chocolate mousse squished between, with chocolate cream cheese frosting spread all over the rest of the cake. It is one big explosion of chocolate that pairs perfectly with a nice cold glass of milk.
Photo Credit: Casey Ulrich
Thank you Casey for this beautiful cake. I know I am drooling in anticipation of that first bite!
Have a terrific weekend everyone and I will see you again on Monday!
- 1 cup boiling water (microwaving works fine)
- 1/2 cup cocoa powder (natural cocoa is darker)
- 1-2/3 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 1/4 tsp baking powder
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 1/2 cup (1 stick) butter, softened
- 1 cupplus 2 tbsp white sugar
- 2 eggs
- 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
- Preheat oven to 350°F. Grease two 8 or 9 inch layer cake pans.
- Place cocoa powder in a medium bowl and pour boiling water over the cocoa powder. Stir and set aside to cool a little bit.
- In a medium bowl, sift together the flour, baking soda, baking powder, and salt. Set aside.
- In your standing mixer, cream together the butter and sugar. Beat in both the eggs. Mix in vanilla extract. Gradually mix in the sifted flour mixture. Finally, stir in the cocoa powder-hot water mixture until the batter is smooth and everything is fully incorporated.
- Pour batter into the two prepared cake pans, smooth tops and bake in preheated oven for 25 to 30 minutes or until toothpick comes out clean and center of cake springs back slightly when gently pressed. Let cool on wire racks completely.
- Yield: 2 (8 or 9 inch) layer cakes)
- Cake layers can be baked ahead, wrapped well in plastic and refrigerated. Cold layers are also easier to frost!
- 1-1/4 cups heavy cream
- 1-1/4 cups semisweet or bittersweet chocolate chips
- Melt chocolate chips with double boiler or in the microwave. Set aside to cool slightly.
- Beat heavy cream with mixer until stiff peaks form and it looks like regular whipped cream. Fold in melted chocolate until fully incorporated.
- Spread between cooled cake layers.
- Yield: 2-1/2 cups
- Casey’s Note: I recommend spreading the mousse filling on the bottom cake layer and refrigerating it for about an hour to let it set a bit before you put the top cake layer on. Mine got pretty messy when I did it all together.
- Jane’s Note: You can also refrigerate the mousse slightly before smoothing it between the cake layers. If it firms up too much, just let it sit at room temperature until it is easy to spread.
- 8 oz cream cheese, at room temperature (regular or low-fat Neufchatel cream cheese both work well)
- 1/4 cup (1/2 stick) butter, at room temperature
- Pinch of salt
- 1/2 cup cocoa powder (I used dark cocoa powder)
- 4 cups powdered sugar, or as needed
- Splash of milk, if needed
- Cream together the cream cheese, butter and salt. Mix in the cocoa powder. Add powdered sugar, 1 cup at a time, beating between each addition. Continue adding powdered sugar until the frosting is to the consistency you like.
- Add milk as needed to thin out the frosting if yours starts to get too thick or dry. Spread on top and sides of layer cake. Enjoy!! 🙂
- Yield: 2 to 3 cups
- Jane’s Note: If this is too soft to spread, you can also chill it slightly to make it firmer.
Thank You!
I love to hear from you … please leave a comment below (and don’t forget to do your math before hitting enter, LOL)!
Candice
Seeing those pictures and the recipe made me feel like I’m in heaven.
Katrina
Those are some really yummy looking cakes–chocolate, just my thing! 😉
Eliot
Triple chocolate? Oh, my! Looks and sounds delicious!